Most Aggressive Leader

[madmaven]

I know this is hard to quantify but I heard someone looked at the XML file and found some to be more aggressive than others. Or, any other thoughts?

Leaders with the "aggressive" trait:

Alexander
Genghis
Huayna Capac
Kublai
Montezuma
Napoleon
Tokugawa

"expansive"
Bismark
Cyrus
Genghis
Isabella
Caesar
Peter
Victoria

 

[Elponitnatsnoc]

From experience, I have found Genghis Khan, Alexander and Monte "Mr. Beserk" Zuma to be the most aggressive. Whenever they are in a game with me, they usually declare war on me at least once.

 

[scienide09]

The leaders with the 'aggressive' gene do tend to be aggressive.

There are also a couple of threads dedicated to Isabella. Many players have found that the AI-controlled Isabella/Spain will always come after the human player. Does that count as being aggressive? Or is it just coincedence that whenever players face Isabella, inevitably she declares war?

 

[sydhe]

I was just playing on a continent with Victoria, Washington, Mansa Musa and Frederick. It was a nice peacful continent, and we were all considerate of each other's feelings.

 

[yatusk]

boy, that must have been boring.

 

[madmaven]

Yeah, that sucks. That's what I'm trying to avoid. I want AIs at war with each other all the time.

 

[Divi Filus]

Montezuma and Alexander are almost xenophobic (a tribute to Silicoids) aggresive... In most maps one of these leaders whips somebody off the map in every game...

Isabella is managable if you have no religion for her to hate...
Kabuli can be unpredictable... but gets himself in too many wars...

 

[suspendinlight]

I find Alexander is the most agressive with Monte coming in a distant second. Don't let Qin Shi Huang fool you either. He isn't as peaceful as his traits make him seem.

 

[Merzbow]

I've gotten both Monte and Huyana to be best friends with me. Alex is a lying, double-crossing dog, however.

 

[jdotmi]

Alex spent so much time ticking me off in my last game that I was trying to get him to declare war on me so I could rip him to shreds (I was trying to be nice and not declare on him). Then he converted to my state religion... Had to win space race as Mansa was way too close for comfort tech wise, and he had Mech Inf before I did (and 4 oils before I had any, good thing my culture slider purloined one from him).

 

[henrycccc]

Its Definatly Alexander the Gay, without a doubt.

 

[Xarathas]

Isabella's problem isn't really her tendency to declare war... it's the fact that she starts with Mysticism and Fishing, which just about always guarantees her an early religion (which means, you most likely won't have the same religion as her unless you get it from her and switch to it). Add that to the fact that she has one of the highest religion modifiers in the game (I think?), you get lots of wars with her

When you share a religion with her, you just about never goes to war with her.

 

[Khaim]

I've noticed that too: Isabella is extremely religious, in that she cares a lot more about religious differences than other leaders. Saladin is a close second, I think, and maybe a few more I haven't noticed yet. They'll give -4 for heathen faith, while others only give -2 or so.

 

[josephstalin]

If you ever play with Alexander and Ceaser on one continent, you are in trouble, trust me. Also Isabella and Montezuman are not a good present either.

 

[sir_q]

If by aggressive you mean irrationally aggressive, Montezuma and Tokugawa. I can't count the number of times they've surprise-attacked one of my cities, only to be brutally eliminated by me twenty turns later.

At least Montezuma is incompetent enough that he's usually cowed before he reaches gunpowder. Tokugawa always manages to limp along a dozen techs behind the rest of the world, still attacking my riflemen and infantry with knights and catapults. Furthermore, he does a terrible job exploiting his samurai, pillages with half his army, attacks with a quarter and leaves the remainder sitting on their thumbs outside my city to attack the following turn, and to top it off, has shown his ugly face in every one of the dozen or more games I've played in the last two weeks.

Everybody hates Alexander, but besides the occasional three opportunistic archers in the ancient age, has never given me any trouble. He's more apt to vote for my diplomatic win than to attack me.

Huayna is kind of a wannabe Montezuma, but usually ends up being too rational to self-destruct the way Montezuma does. Must be that financial trait.

Isabella is just a rotten wench. Napoleon is actually kind of nice - in the rare game where he shows up, he's not hard to befriend. Hatshepsut gets really, really mad because I'm rarely her religion, but she never declares war.

Genghis is all bark and no bite. Kublai's as peaceful as Gandhi.

 

[Sadan01]

Alexander and Caesar are a lot of fun if you are sharing a continent with them both.... If you are a warmonger that is... Alexander, I've found, is one of the most irrational, conniving, psychotic, and just plain crazy leaders in the game. He can declare war on a whim, even when you have worked hard to build good relations with him. Now, I've learnt my lesson with him. Whenever he is in the game, no matter where he is located, I am wary. I've even had him turn allies against me and get them to declare war on me (these are allies with over +15 relations!)...

Caesar is not that much better although I have managed to have a couple of peaceful games with him - even one where we were allies of a sort (although no "official" defensive pact signed).

Frederick I find to be a huge pain in the arse later in the game. He will usually pick on the smaller civs to start with (which generally doesnt include me) but after quite a number of years of conquest, I think his head gets a little too big for his boots and then starts to pick on neighbours that might just be either a little bit bigger or a little stronger than him. He is more a pain (especially when striving towards a diplo or culture victory) than a real threat.

Genghis Khan and his Keshiks are a threat that cannot be ignored on any map, unless you happened to be so much more advanced and bigger than they are. On harder levels, this is unlikely as I've found they usually go on a rampage early and hit hard.

As another poster said, if you are religious, and especially the same religion as Isabella, then she generally wont give you many problems. In fact, she can be a great help - at least in my experience.

So my vote would have to go towards either Alexander or Genghis Khan. Tokugawa is a leader I've not had much experience with.

 

[calyth]

As another poster said, if you are religious, and especially the same religion as Isabella, then she generally wont give you many problems. In fact, she can be a great help - at least in my experience.

If you are facing Isabella, and didn't really found a religion, and she's big enough to pose even an annoyance, it might be worth it to adopt her religion (you can do this without having any spread, I think, at the penalty of anarchy).
For many times I don't share religion with her, she has always gone off the handle and start attacking for no good reasons. I could have 3 longbowman in every city, and enough capacity to build a good army in a very short time and she'll still try and fight you.

 

[Sir Toma]

Montezuma is an absolute nut case.
I was at +7 or 8 with him and all i had to do to triiger a full blown war with him was to refuse a right of passage. Geez. From then on i played as Montezuma more often as i meant i didn't have to fight him!

 

[panzooka]

aggresive trait dont care about relationships, but some exceptions like incan, they are aggresive anciant classical time, but really nice friendly later on.

and ye, everyone hates isabella, why would u want to share a religion with this wench? especialy a religion she founded.

same goes for saladin, i was free religion, but some how to get him pleased to me, and he will still back stab me.
i had my game where i was free religion, isabella founds buddism and saladin adopted it. i was pleased with saladin by bribing him with lots free resources. about 4 free resources.(im going diplomatic victory)
he then suddenly declare war, razed 1 of my city.
then isabella declared war with me too, but never gets a chance to land some troops on my continent, i had 2 destoryer and 1 submarine patroling.


other than the religious aggression
ghengis khan - ask tributes and help alot, then gets furious, then war
montezuma - willingness to march jaguars from other side of the world to my territory only to found out they are now obsolute
alexander - behaves like saladin, he can be really nice to u, then stab u in the back. he will attack anyone who have less military unit than him, and will attack again as soon as peace treaty expires

none aggressive- aggressive leaders
kublai khan - usually pick smaller civs early on, but can be trust worthy later on.
tokugawa - usually pick smaller civs early on, then lacks tech to do any harm later on
napoleon - mix between kublai and tokugawa
huayna - same as napolean

trust worthy friends
ghandi
asoka - but religious
bismarck - very nice
woshingtong
roosevelt
Hatshepsut
Victoria - not Elizabeth
Mansa Musa - trustworthy but really competitive in techs, best to kill him early, and never vote for me in UN

 

[UnspokenRequest]

You're all discussing this as if the leaders really had different personalities. But, do they? I mean, beside their two traits having effect on the way the AI plays the game.

Are there other modifiers that have impact on the different leaders in order to make obseravtion like: "this one asks more tributes, this one goes into irrational war, etc." Or is it just all impressions?

For instance, George Washington declared war on me even though we shared the same religion, we traded a lot of goods, we had open borders, I was MUCH more powerful than he was... Our relations were near the 20s or something. I was about to propose a defensive pact and suddenly he attacks me...

However, Washington is not supposed to be a warmonger, from what I read here. He's even classified as a "trustworthy friend". That's not what I call trustworthy...